By all accounts my first venture into the realm of international travel and paid hunts was a dismal failure

(Yes, when you are from GA Canada is considered legitimate international travel)

Anyway I'll give you the synopsis of the hunt
May 27 through June 6
Black Bear
On the Paliser River

Day 1, afternoon hunt, sunny with some clouds moving in, walked about 8 miles No bear.

Day 2, all day, rain

Day 3, all day, heavy rain

Day 4, all day, light rain

Day 5, all day, rain

Day 6, all day, heavy rain and the animals came 2x2

Day 7, morning hunt..........rain

People more experienced than me would have probably called the trip a complete failure, good thing I'm a newbie. I had a blast.

I couldn't have been more pleased with the outfitter, Sean Beswick, he was intelligent and professional.
Camp was not the Ritz but it was clean, comfortable and roomy. (The only problem occurred when my hunting partner, Frank, blew out the only flushable toilet.....thanks Frank.)
The guides were hard working and knowledgeable, we did the usual driving on the logging roads scenario but we also put in at least 8 but usually 12 miles walking per day, AND, we went out twice on horseback up the paliser and Albert Rivers 5 hours a pop.
If hard work = bear we should have killed the limit. When Sean, my hunting partner Frank, and I were talking after the hunt Frank put it best when he said "that's why we call it hunting and not killing".

We saw everything but the Black Bear I had a tag for...80+ each of Whitetail and Mule deer....
We quit counting at 60 Elk (several of which were absolutely huge bucks)....12 Moose two of which were the largest Shirah Moose I've ever seen (that would be on TV since they are scarce in GA).....Big Horn and Mountain Goats.
(Another hunter from Mississippi, an attorney, had just come from a hunt in Alaska. He said that where he had been in Alaska could not hold a candle to the amount of wildlife he saw while he was here)...........and best of all two grizzly.
(After about 5 days of walking in the rain I tried my best to convince my guide that the Grizz looked like a black bear.)

The boar grizz was an absolute hog. I know the mountain bears do not grow as big as the coastal bears you usually see in magazines and on TV but when I spotted this guy there was no doubt that he was a monster. He actually had a strut to his walk. He knew he was the baddest SOB on the mountain.
Based on this visual and the tracks our guide estimated him to be well over 7.5ft

The scenery was nothing short of heaven. It was absolutely incredible. After day two of staring up at the peaks in awe our guide finally asked us to please swallow and quit drooling on ourselves.

You would think that walking 8-12 miles a day would make you lose weight......wrong; thanks to the camp cook, Don, and that fine Canadian beer I am proud to say that I actually gained a pound or two.


So seven days of hard work and no bear, I guess I wont do that again........Like hell.

You folks in BC have a beautiful land and some really nice people.....I hope you can keep it that way.

Sounds like a great trip. Some of my favourite hunts have been ones where we took no game at all.

Hunts with no game are great if the companions are friednly, the scenery fantastic, and seeing all that other game is an abolutely terrific bonus. As I tell my young boy scouts who complain about rain on a weekend campout...." rain does not ruin a campout, it just makes it more memorable"..

Congrats on your hunt, .44. Glad you had a good time at least.

Will you be going back? I am surprised you didn't see any black bears at all. The East Kootenays have a pretty healthy population of bears and they're not usually too hard to find in June. Rain will screw things up in a big way though. The bears seem to like to hunkerdown under a big spruce tree when its wet out.

Glad that you enjoyed hunting with Sean. He's a good guy.

Cheers,
Canuck

I am from the Kootenays, the finest part of BC/Canada and am familiar with that area, in fact I was just there a few days after you were! I admire your sportsmanship and appreciation of our landscape/wildlife and hope you can and will return. You seem to be the kind of gentleman and real hunter that is very welcome here.

I did not see any Blackies up there either, but, about two days later, I was driving through the Chilcotin to Bella Coola and Blacks were everywhere, saw about a dozen just along the highway, including one nice boar. I have spoken to Sean Beswick on the phone and he is a fine example of what a Guide/Outfitter should be, IMO. so, try again, maybe you will get a big one!

Oh yeah, I am one of the people here who has fought for wilderness preservation for decades, we are trying to keep our land pristine, but, it is a hell of a struggle.

Glad you had fun!

I probably shouldn't tell you this now that it's too late, but I'm pretty sure wet grizzlies count as blacks....

Well, sounds like a familiar story.

First time guided hunt, first bear hunt. We went with Steven Leuenberger in the Kootenay's, and we were rained out, too. I didn't SEE a bear, though my partner nailed the two he saw toward the end of the hunt.

Nonetheless, I've got nothing but good to say about Steven, and the guide area. Lots of game including moose, elk, mulies, goats, and sheep.

I'm open to ideas, but I'd be glad to return to the same place. If I'd go elsewhere, it'd be to see a new area and meet new people, not because of disappointment.

My guide felt horrible that I didn't get a look at a bear, but I told him that he did everything I paid him to do, and the last thing I'd want would be a guarantee.

I am very familiar with Stephen Leuenberger's territory, I used to "lookout" down there and also worked on "staff" there for the BCFS, some 40 years back; I also managed a private reforestation project there (never again!).

I have talked to him on the phone and he is a real gentleman and very honest, I think that he would be a good choice for ANY hunter to book with. The problem really is that the good old days are over and the game in that area takes a pretty hard thumping from we resident hunters. The game is there, but, very wary and the hunting is tough, often very, very tough. But, for a real sportsman who appreciates the enormous beauty of the area and finds value in hunting beyond simply filling tags, the Kootenays is maybe the ultimate destination....come back, your kind of ethics is exactly what Canucks like me admire.

Well, if the good old days are over, they must've been something.

We saw tons of game every day. Moose all over. Elk were reliably seen whenever glassing. Mulies? All over. The low country had plenty of whitetails. And there were goats above us most of the time. Saw some bighorns, too.

I'm not disappointed in the amount of game, and I'd be pleased to hunt there again. Just that damn weather. Just another reason to book long hunts.

We saw a couple of locals hunting the place. No big deal. I don't think they were impacting the area at all.

For me, the problem is that I'd like to go back to the Kootenays, but I'd also like to see other areas of wilderness. A good problem to have, I guess.

The Kootenays in the '40s, '50s and early '60s was almost beyond belief in the amount, variety and relatively accessible game. Tragically, the snarl of the powersaw, roar of the "Cat", stripmining, hydrodam building and invasion of outlanders such as American dopesmoking, poaching draftdodgers severely impacted my homeland and today it is a pale shadow of fifty years ago.

You should try to book with Barry Thompkins of "Big Nine" or whatever he calls it now, Canuck will know, in Northeastern B.C. and with Miles Bradford in Northwestern B.C. These guys are maybe the best outfitters in the north and Stone Mountain Safaris is also first class; they are NOT inexpensive, but, the trips are worth the cost.

In B.C., you will often find that even a very experienced, local hunter will get skunked and your idea concerning a longer hunt is the best method of coping with our conditions. The thing is, with today's technology, you can keep your game meat chilled at one of the outlying cabin camps, get into Fort Nelson or even Toad River or Dease Lake and drive home with good meat to the USA; it;s doable with good coolers and the meat is just a huge bonus to your trophy.

I'm a bit surprised that the moose and the elk antlers were so large already ?

The Moose, deer, mulies and Elk were in Velvet and they were judged by the guides on their potential racks. I can attest to their body size. (we have some good video footage of a bull moose on the road, I sat on the window sill of the truck, hanging out while holding on to the "OH shit" bar with one hand, while the guide tried to get me close enough for my still camera....apparently Moose are quite fast and my skills with a camera were lacking) I have some decent Mulie photos and some good scenery shots. However the rain kept the cameras back at the camp for most of the hunt.

The rain seems to have been the culprit. Also it seems that the area was greener than normal for this time of year. The blacks didn't have to expose themselves as much to find it and once the rain started they apparently "laid up". They were killing bears before we arrived up to the 1st day of the hunt then the weather changed.
The really sucky part was that when I made it home it rained here for 5 more days......My wife didn't want me to hang a bear rug anywhere so I accused her of Voodoo.......

Anyway, we had fun.
I am thinking about telling the story of the "First Annual Paliser Rodeo and River Crossing" ....I had a camera but the exposure was wrong, we could have sold the pictures for good money.

quote:

Originally posted by Canuck:
Congrats on your hunt, .44. Glad you had a good time at least.

Will you be going back? I am surprised you didn't see any black bears at all. The East Kootenays have a pretty healthy population of bears and they're not usually too hard to find in June. Rain will screw things up in a big way though. The bears seem to like to hunkerdown under a big spruce tree when its wet out.

Glad that you enjoyed hunting with Sean. He's a good guy.

Cheers,
Canuck

I am planning to go back......I am in the process of convincing my Brother, brother - in - law and several nephews to join me. That way we will take over the whole camp.

It will not be in 2006 but we should make it in 2007.
After that I am saving for Africa.

Well, it's been said that nothing ruins a good hunt faster than by pulling the trigger. Glad you had a good time.

it hasn't quit raining since you left

Same here....first a tropical storm then a hurricane.......Damn, I need to find the witch doctor my wife used to jinx me and have him shot.

I hunted the Kootenays last June and had a ball. Saw tons of elk, mulies, whitetails, moose and grizzly.

I was hunting for black bear and the weather when I arrived was HOT The first afternoon I took a nice cinnaman bear. The next 4 days it rained and rained and the bears must have melted.... we saw only a few small bears.

I counted the hunt a success due to the great outfitter, guide, scenery, and the main thing was that I wasnt at work.The nice bear was a bonus.